


Liaison

by FicticiousDelicious



Category: Bleach
Genre: Birthday, Bisexuality (implied), Blood, Canon Abstracted (and vague), Canon Divergent, Combat, Complete, DO NOT REPOST MY FANWORKS, Enemies to Friends to More (implied), Gift Giving, Homosexuality, Infidelity, M/M, Mentions Suicide (vaguely), One Shot, Open-Ended Story is Open-Ended, Pain, Passion, Urban and Suburban Life, Violence, affair
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-01
Updated: 2020-08-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:01:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25657093
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FicticiousDelicious/pseuds/FicticiousDelicious
Summary: Seemingly for the first time someone sees fit to celebrate Grimmjow's birthday. Armed with a small present and the drive to deliver it Ichigo searches for the arrancar and finds more than he realized..All characters are adults!This oneshot is complete!This is not perfect canon to Bleach.This is an Ao3 exclusive story! You'll only find it here.!!Disclaimer!! I do not own the characters mentioned in Liaison nor do I make any profit of any kind from their mention. Ownership of these Bleach characters and settings goes to Tite Kubo. All Characters/Settings © Tite KuboDeviantArt.com/FicticiousDelicious or FicticiousDelicious.Tumblr.com
Relationships: GrimmIchi, Grimmjow Jaegerjaques/Kurosaki Ichigo, Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez/Ichigo Kurosaki
Comments: 2
Kudos: 24





	Liaison

**Author's Note:**

> I'm a day late because I ran out of time to finish this on Grimmjow's birthday (July 31st) so it's belated but it's here!  
> I wish my favorite character of all time many happy returns.

_A one-shot fanfiction written by FicticiousDelicious._

After the wars and conflict we’d endured it was like something sent out a universal notice; everything stopped fighting and behaved. Strangest of all was the way that things from other worlds meshed into ours – the human world. Shinigami and souls were standard but arrancars and quincy did too. It was welcoming the defeated home – our enemies turned strange allies. Aside from those that gave their lives, it felt like we were all born again. No one has any good reason to fight each other anymore except one guy, who never leaves me alone thanks to Urahara and a stupid promise…

If you wanted to find this certain fellow, Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez, in the human world you’d have to start looking downtown, somewhere between Karakura and Kagamino. A few other arrancar and a quincy have settled around there, as far as Urahara and Yoruichi have told me. I didn’t know that they were around for the first few years; things were just so quiet and suppressed. I don’t even know how Grimmjow has abstained from picking fights with me at length, or just long enough to get settled, but he’s back to old habits and he’s the only one: the only one that ever picks fights anymore. I think he doesn’t want the peace to dull him. Maybe I think a few more things but I’m not sure how to develop those thoughts. So we fight. Then he tries to disappear, no matter who comes out on top, and waits a while until we’re recovered to turn up again – for another fight.

Explaining the injuries I get from this isn’t worth it. In this time of peace no one understands why I still get hurt. If only they’d just remember that one who protects will always be one to get hurt because they’re right between lines – the front. It’s a lifelong thing and my primary job. I like my job; I love it actually.

As I walk the distance from a bus stop, it’s cheaper than a car, I’m on my way through Kagamino’s downtown and I look over the regularly dirty pavement in daylight and consider this: if we weren’t taught that something is dirty we’d just think it was in its natural state. As I look up I see nice but tall buildings and some houses with their protective walls and railing balconies with green plants and wonder… I’ve never been here before, there’s a paper in my pocket with Grimmjow’s building on it which Yoruichi scratched out for me. I made her promise not to tell Urahara or anyone that I was doing this. There have been a lot of promises over the past years… In my other pocket there’s a wrapped box small enough to sit in the palm of my hand. I wonder which of these grey, tan or white buildings I’m walking by on the street is Grimmjow’s. Does he live in a house? An apartment? How did he get it? And why does he need it?

While passing strangers from this city on the paved streets I consider what I learned about this promise Urahara made to him: a right to be in the human world – for Grimmjow. Others were given sort of the same by the Court Guard Squads but on they’re on leashes. As far as I know, Grimmjow ducked every leash and offer that they had ready. After we’d won that last war he’d disappeared. You can’t be pressured or forced into a leash if you’re not there for it I suppose. I guess Urahara’s promise was enough…and all of the freedom that it implies. The shop probably had a hand in various arrancar and quincies’ recoveries because not everyone was received by the Court Guard. For Grimmjow, Urahara also threw in a gigai with all of that so no human really understands what walks among them, but it’s deadly, and we’re all lucky that he’s not interested in common prey. That’s probably the only reason. I can’t be mad that Urahara is intentionally pitting Grimmjow against me if it means that no one else has to suffer his violent nature. I protect people; this is part of it. Since the Court Guard can’t police the void that gargantas open onto, I think any unleashed arrancar is free to come and go between Hueco Mundo and the Human World or Soul Society. Apparently he comes and goes between his and our worlds often. Grimmjow still behaves like he’s unleashed; that’s never changed, now he’s just harder to find.

Some information was passed here from the Court Guard to Urahara, I don’t think I was supposed to know but I found it out anyway. Yoruichi still tells me things to watch me dance, I swear. Aizen admitted to when, where and how he created his army – the arrancar, in detail and what they were before he found them. I’ve never been one to absorb details like that; my head’s busy enough, however…we’ve all come into existence at one point or another. Thanks to her brothers I usually bring Nel a gift on her birthday. Now it’s Grimmjow’s turn, if I can find him.

Among busy people passing by Ichigo stopped walking the day-lit streets of the busier part of downtown Kagamino in front of a tall grey building with a number on its front face that matched the number on a note someone wrote for him. It was just the cross streets and building number, not the unit or floor. Dressed in a light shirt and trendy pants with a wallet chain at his hip and some checkered slip-on shoes on his feet, Ichigo left the daylight outside for the shade of the open hallway entrance to the apartment building. When he came through the walkway the passage was mostly quiet. It smelled of cement, stale city air and the faintest hint of cigarettes. This place was plain but clean and standard, not ornate or dressed up. A couple of birds were hiding in the upper parts of the hallway entrance and watched the human under them. Ichigo’s footsteps echoed and he walked slow as he looked around the unfamiliar dim passage and found that there were units with many floors past this entrance and a leasing office. After a few questions to the office manager he found out that there was no one named ‘Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez’ renting here. Unsurprising. Why would Grimmjow give humans his actual name? He just wouldn’t.

Without a clear plan to find the arrancar, Ichigo walked out of the office hands in pockets and coolly looking around. There were some visible tenants around this bundle of units, seeming like just one building from the front, and they were walking up and down the stairways or standing outside of their doors. Soft chatter and echoing footsteps occupied the dense space. Ichigo cut loose just a bit of his reiatsu. If Grimmjow was here that would be all he should need to do. He strolled into plain view between the tall units where he could be spotted and also see upward to the open sky past the floors way over his head. Sunshafts shone down in on the upper floors.

It took a single minute for a man with trademark blue hair, wearing a heavy jacket, no shirt under, jeans with ripped-out knees and dark sneakers to appear on the dim ground floor. Imposing and observant Grimmjow stood apart from Kurosaki, it was so easy to notice him, by the stairs he’d descended with hands similarly in pockets. He stared at the shinigami.

Ichigo stared back for a moment before advancing toward a tolerant-looking Grimmjow. “I didn’t hear you coming.”

“That’s the _point_. What the fuck do you want?” And how the fuck had Kurosaki known what building to come to? Grimmjow groused and he probably wasn’t in the mood for extended conversation.

Ichigo stopped approaching a respectful distance apart in the shade by the stairs. A breeze from above was coming down but it wasn’t terribly refreshing.

Tenants casually and passively watched the two and others. There was the sound of light chatter and some doors opening and closing and more feet walking around above. This was a very busy building in a very busy part of downtown Kagamino.

Ichigo just stayed focused on Grimmjow. “Do we have a place to talk?”

‘Talk’ was the last thing this man seemed to want; Grimmjow started looking more irritated. Not only was he not prepared to be civil but he didn’t exactly like Kurosaki approaching him with a request. Things usually happened on _his_ terms. With a peevish attitude Grimmjow pivoted wordlessly and started stomping back up the stairs heavily.

Ichigo followed; he wasn’t rebuked. On their way up Ichigo started to realize how dismal this building and its units were as the floors felt like they were getting less and less clean the further up they went. This was nothing like other buildings where people had porches and plants. He certainly would have _never_ wanted to live in a place like this…because he considered it dirty.

If nothing else Grimmjow’s pace and posture hinted how little he wanted to do with this right now. They ascended seven floors and then walked a hallway that led to the back side of one of the units and stopped at a door. It smelled musky here. Grimmjow hadn’t locked it and opened it right away. Inside of his apartment he b-lined for a window, yanking the blinds up and opened it to air the place out.

Stepping in cautiously Ichigo shut the door with a tug he felt was more than it should need, if the door had been aligned properly in the first place… He turned his eyes to the space he was in. This apartment was a funky mess, nothing like his house. The carpet was stained and the walls were dirty white or grey; it was hard to tell in the dim atmosphere. At least it didn’t smell like it did outside but there was a scent he couldn’t figure out; it wasn’t just man-funk. Clothes were strewn over the unmade futon bed that was for sleeping with empty food containers resting on every conceivable surface. There were no lights on, just the sunlight from the one window.

Grimmjow had a ton of workout gear and a punching bag occupied this main room; unlike most humans he’d pushed a television out of the way for those things. “Make it quick, what’d you want?” he groused again, crossing his arms and staying away from the shinigami and standing by the window. His bare chest moved with breath under the unseasonable heavy jacket.

Ichigo wandered away from the door and toward Grimmjow who looked a bit defensive; he handed off a wrapped box to the arrancar. The gesture was harmless. “Happy birthday.”

Grimmjow made a face as he took the gift.

“According to the human calendar yours is today.”

“Why are you doing this?” Being sentimental. Grimmjow shook the small box at the giver; it rattled a little.

Ichigo shrugged. “I’m glad you exist.”

Grimmjow’s face lost the anger but none of the intensity. “Tch.” He sidestepped around the shinigami and went into the apartment’s small, enclosed kitchen.

Ichigo could hear the wrapping paper tearing from a distance and smiled a sharp little smile before he turned back and made for the door. “See you…” He didn’t expect more from Grimmjow; he was surprised that the arrancar had even taken the gift.

“Kurosaki.”

Ichigo stopped and turned with his hand on the door.

“Please tell me this isn’t a human wedding band.”

Quickly embarrassed Ichigo croaked, “It’s a self-defense ring!”

“Good.”

“Damnit, Grimmjow…”

Grimmjow was tapping a finger on top of the points on the surface of the thick steel ring. “What? How the fuck should I know what human gifts mean?”

Ichigo looked frustrated, and maybe a little flushed. “I said it was a birthday gift! Why would you think I’d give you a wedding band?” There was a long tense pause where they just stared across the dim and messy apartment and then Ichigo watched Grimmjow silently put the pointy ring on his right hand’s middle finger and walk back into the kitchen without a word.

It took a minute. “As a _joke_ ,” Grimmjow’s voice called after a fridge could be heard opening.

The tension only increased. Ichigo went against his good sense and didn’t leave the apartment right away. He went after Grimmjow for some reason who was now going through a fridge in the kitchen that looked like it was entirely stocked with various energy drinks and prepackaged meals. Ichigo stopped in the kitchen’s doorway. This room was a fantastic mess too. Dishes, empty containers and cans everywhere. Where did Grimmjow even get the money for that human stuff and how did this man ever sleep with that much caffeine at his disposal? This place smelled unlike Grimmjow. Looking unsettled Ichigo waited another minute as he looked around. Something wasn’t right. Instead of giving the arrancar hell for the ring immediately Ichigo set in about the food while Grimmjow chugged from an energy drink can. “You know that stuff is terrible for you.”

Grimmjow finished the can and squeezed it to death in one hand with a crunch. “You know, I don’t care.” This gigai body felt defective, it got weary too quickly and these drinks completely changed that. Without reservation Grimmjow would use this fake body until he _broke it_. Both men in the yellowed lighting of the kitchen space stared at each other, not really moving. Maybe a knife couldn’t even cut this tension, but someone had to pick up that knife and try in the first place.

“I care.” Ichigo looked stubborn, straightening his light shirt.

“I can see that,” Grimmjow snapped smartly after ditching the can in a trash bin and went to push his way past the shinigami to get out of the kitchen, but Kurosaki wouldn’t let him pass so the arrancar burped in Kurosaki’s face who lurched back and then he could get past.

“ _Ugh!_ Dang…what the hell?!” Ichigo waved a hand in front of his own face and stood back as Grimmjow went up a short hallway and into a presumed bathroom and closed the door _hard_. Ichigo was tempted and walked up the hall too. He could bang on the door and yell at Grimmjow for being stupid but instead of that Ichigo took notice of an open room opposite the bathroom. He peeked his head in. It was a shockingly clean bedroom. One window, a tidy floor, a made single bed, an organized dresser with an air freshener and a desk with a chair. The carpet and walls looked cleaner too. It smelled a lot like linen and Grimmjow in here.

“The fuck you doing?” Grimmjow’s voice came out of nowhere.

Ichigo jumped. “I-”

“Stay outta my shit…” Grimmjow warned as he’d suddenly and silently come out of the bathroom. He was tempted to yank Kurosaki away but that would mean touching him… Grimmjow’s hand merely twitched and he walked back up the hall into the main area of the apartment. “Don’t be touching my shit!” he warned again at a distance.

Ichigo was slow to follow back up the dim, stale carpeted hall but as he returned to the main room he noticed Grimmjow picking up and making it cleaner. The unusual feeling about what was going on here got bigger. “Grimmjow, is this someone _else’s_ apartment?”

“Yeah.”

Ichigo swallowed. “Did you kill them?”

“Maybe.”

“This isn’t a joke! You could get-” The shinigami looked quickly concerned.

Grimmjow straightened up with the blankets from the futon over his forearm and a fistful of clothes. “I’m not joking. I’m not gonna tell you what happened to them.”

Ichigo looked very worried as he got a chill. Maybe they were terribly mistaken and Grimmjow was actually hurting people. …or maybe it was just the arrancar’s sense of humor that was cruel. The shinigami waited until Grimmjow had put some of the things he was picking up aside and Grimmjow was folding the futon back into a couch. Ichigo glanced at the workout equipment: a bench for pressing, free weights and that beat-up punching bag. He started to wonder why Grimmjow was hurriedly picking up what looked like a long-standing mess – suddenly seeming to care about the cleanliness. Then Ichigo started to get the feeling that this was nervous cleaning. He waited around patiently while Grimmjow picked up everything in the main room and cleaned out some of the kitchen. Literally an hour went by and the sun started to go down while he was here.

It didn’t seem like Grimmjow realized how long he’d been at it until he saw Kurosaki sitting on the futon very comfortably. “Why’re you still here?”

“I didn’t realize I was supposed to leave.” Ichigo stared at the arrancar. He was going to leave…but something was tying him down. “Do you _want_ me to leave?” Ichigo asked more directly.

Grimmjow neglected to answer that directly. “All I want is to kill you.”

“Right. If I died you’d be happy? Or you’d be bored?”

Grimmjow looked away without a word and crossed his arms; the heavy leather jacket made a folding, leathery sound as his arms bent.

Ichigo decided that it was probably time to go – before it got really dark and more awkward.

Grimmjow saw him out, shutting the apartment door with oomph. Everything he did felt like a message to get out; he just never said it.

The shinigami looked back at the door once, reading that nonverbal message loud and clear, then kept going through the hall, down the stairs and to the stale air on the ground floor again then started to walk out of the passage leading into this building’s units and back out onto the downtown streets. It was dusk. He stopped. This felt wrong; the way he’d left Grimmjow… Ichigo rushed back, running up the stairs and jogging around the hall and banged on Grimmjow’s door.

Grimmjow opened the door to a panting shinigami. In a second Kurosaki threw a punch. Grimmjow backpedaled, bare feet on the carpet.

Coming back in like an invader Ichigo shut and locked the apartment door. He couldn’t leave the arrancar without a fight.

Grimmjow took an aggressive stance. He knew what this was. No more evasive behavior. Grimmjow slammed a charging shinigami on the floor and Kurosaki flipped Grimmjow off who hit the carpet harder. They heard the downstairs neighbors hit the ceiling and complain but they ignored it. Grimmjow flipped around and attacked Kurosaki who kicked him in the mouth and knocked him bruisingly up against the workout bench with a clank. The arrancar coughed and pitched a free weight at the shinigami like it was made of foam.

Ichigo grabbed the weight and swung it back as Grimmjow lunged and narrowly missed hitting him, dropping the weight as the arrancar picked him up and drove Ichigo’s back against the wall enclosing the kitchen with two grunts of effort from each of them. That made a couple huge thumps and the neighbors complained more. Ichigo tried to punch Grimmjow as they grappled and he refused to get pinned but Grimmjow had his arm. Instead the shinigami headbutted Grimmjow who immediately let go and stumbled back with bloody lip. Ichigo came after him.

Grimmjow gave Kurosaki a swift, brutal kick to the side for that one; he was flexible and fit so that happened faster than observation could register.

Ichigo went to the floor cringing and hit his head on the edge of the futon.

Grimmjow shook his limbs around.

There was pounding at the apartment door.

Grimmjow told whomever to fuck off.

Head ringing Ichigo barely realized that this was probably security but stumbled to get to the door before Grimmjow could piss them off more. With a gash on his forehead from hitting the furniture at some point, Ichigo opened the door. He had a hard time persuading the security that they’d had a mishap while moving some workout equipment but the excuse did take and they got off with a warning. The apartment door was closed again with a sigh. Ichigo leaned his back on it…his head was still ringing and throbbing.

Grimmjow watched from a seated place on the workout bench. They didn’t comment for the first few minutes. They were both in bodies that were more fragile than they were used to fighting each other in.

Ichigo slowly got up and staggered toward Grimmjow.

Grimmjow got up too and swung at Kurosaki who dodged and threw a swift punch of his own but the arrancar evaded that and took careful steps back to get around the bench so he wouldn’t be tripped.

Ichigo walked on, kicking off his shoes to make it fairer, then advanced quickly and accidentally punched a wall as Grimmjow dropped down and slugged him in the knee then started taking Ichigo down to hold him on the floor. Surprisingly they were not making enough noise to annoy the neighbors further. Ichigo’s knee hurt a lot because of that ring he’d given Grimmjow. He watched the sweaty arrancar climb over him and couldn’t help getting pinned; Grimmjow beat his face bloody until Ichigo couldn’t keep it straight and then the shinigami felt Grimmjow getting off of him. “Nnnnn…” He was sweaty and he smelled of both of them and blood.

Grimmjow stood back and looked at Kurosaki’s sort of swollen and bruised, bloody face and then at his hands. He didn’t feel bad; he felt tingly with adrenaline. That was one thing these bodies had a surprising lot of. On his hand with the pointed ring there was more blood. Some of the sanguine matter had gotten on the carpet. Kurosaki laying there helpless for a minute was satisfying to see.

Ichigo started to get up. He was hurting – a swollen cheek, black eye, the gash on his head and some punctures and bruises from that ring. His knee was sore and he was sure he’d have other bruises.

Most of his pain from a sore back, Grimmjow just watched as the shinigami paced himself and Kurosaki stumbled toward the kitchen. The fight was over. He was fine with that, shifty blue eyes minding where his opponent was going…in case he was the only one that knew they were done. By the time Grimmjow followed him Kurosaki had turned on the sink’s cold water and stuck his head under it with a miserable groan.

The water that ran over the dishes and into the basin was red, but it was cold and it made his skin throb less. Ichigo had a hard time breathing correctly. He stared at the dirty dishes with water streaming over them. Had this been stupid?

A less injured but still bruised and bloodied Grimmjow licked the blood off of his split lip. He slowly walked up behind Kurosaki at the sink and waited until Kurosaki took his soaked head of orange hair out from under the water to offer a cloth.

There was a dishtowel waiting for Ichigo, and as he was drying his hair and face off with it he vaguely started to realize that Grimmjow was helping or holding onto him. He was blinking the water out of his eyes to see. Ichigo felt his tailbone bump the counter of the sink and breathing picked up as Grimmjow’s hands had been helping dry him off but were now on his shoulders. Somewhere between being delirious from the beating and ok with being helped Ichigo was allowing the arrancar to dry him off, pull up his shirt and _kiss_ him. All he could smell right now was the blood and Grimmjow’s sweat.

Just following some urge, Grimmjow started a fairly deep kiss, painful to one because of Kurosaki’s swollen cheek and other sore features, but when the shinigami didn’t throw him off it got heated. Lips paired, tongues slipped and heads tilted to get the best out of it for a minute and then it was gone. Grimmjow backed up.

The dishtowel slipped off his shoulders and into the sink. Ichigo covered his mouth as he was still back against the counter holding the basin. He started to realize what had just happened.

Grimmjow snarled when the shinigami’s eyes didn’t falter their stare. “What?!”

Now Ichigo briefly glanced aside for a second as he was gripping the counter behind his back just to stay standing. He felt the trickle of a little blood flowing from the gash on his forehead. He wanted to ask Grimmjow why he’d done that but he couldn’t make the words.

The arrancar swallowed and waited.

Letting his hand fall down Ichigo stared at Grimmjow again. “I can’t be doing this…” He shook his head faintly.

Grimmjow looked pissed again. He narrowed his eyes and gave a hostile snarl. “ _Fine_.” Then he stormed away into the dim and dark apartment. “Get _out!_ ” His voice boomed from somewhere.

Ichigo started to pull his shirt back down and straightened it as he was in a hurry to leave. He had to find his shoes and put them on in a rush by the door, starting to realize that he had the slightest fear of the dark right now. This apartment was shady, getting darker and he had no idea where Grimmjow was at. With shoes on Ichigo pulled open the front door and didn’t look back as he left, jogging through the hall and down the flights of stairs. Shit…he had to take the bus home. In the waning dusk light Ichigo was among people again and picked his way to the stop were lots of them waited for the same thing. Anxiously he checked the schedule, luckily there was a bus looping back to Karakura coming soon. When all of that rushing fell away Ichigo started to feel hollow for having left like that. The feeling got worse and worse, but he got on that damn bus.

This wasn’t his apartment. This wasn’t even really where he wanted to be.

Ichigo sat on the bus and sighed as the last of people were getting on and settling. He stared out of his window in what he regarded a foolish, dreamy gaze… He should stop considering what had just happened. Ichigo jerked when someone sat down next to him abruptly; he stared at them.

Grimmjow stared back. “Fuck you,” he grumbled.

Ichigo immediately looked irritated, “Well fuck you,” he muttered back. It sounded awkward because he wasn’t used to cussing like that. The bus had started to drive and the windows with evening’s backing and some fixtures rattled with the quiet ambient sounds of other passengers.

The smell of everyone else on that bus was lost, except for one. What Grimmjow wanted was obvious, whether he would get it was up in the air. He hated and craved the way that Kurosaki made everything more difficult by trying to be moral. Kurosaki wasn’t perfect but he was goodly enough that Grimmjow wanted to tear into him and nest in that; to live in Kurosaki’s soul as the dark spot that caused him pain and pleasure. The one he couldn’t forget. The one he couldn’t live without fighting against. The one he wouldn’t have let anyone else have…if only this shinigami’s life hadn’t gone the way it did after the final war…

Ichigo’s eyes pulled away and he tried not to consider whether anyone was staring at them.

Grimmjow was blind to the concept that people were staring at them. One guy looking seriously beat-up and another coming to sit really close and their muttering short words…undoubtably suspicious. He bet that Kurosaki’s face was throbbing, and that black eye looked especially bad. He felt like touching it.

“I absolutely cannot do this.” Ichigo sounded resolute.

Grimmjow sat back a little and glared all around, an urge to tear up everything in sight. He figured he couldn’t have what he wanted; he knew he couldn’t take it by force either…if he tried to it just wouldn’t be the same. They rode the bus without talking until it came back to Karakura. Night had fallen and Grimmjow was no closer to untangling his thoughts.

The bus had stilled and Ichigo stood up.

Grimmjow almost didn’t let him pass and had to be stepped over. He stayed in his seat.

“Are you coming or not?”

Those words weren’t expected at all and the arrancar looked up with a peevish confusion to find Kurosaki waiting for him. He got up slow and followed the shinigami off of the bus. They stood at the stop’s designating pole, just them, as it drove away and were left in the near dark with only street lamps lighting the night around them.

Grimmjow swallowed and stared ahead of himself.

Ichigo shifted his feet in checkered shoes and looked restless.

Grimmjow just waited with the cool air of evening moving his hair and his open jacket. Eventually he put his hands in his pockets.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t want to make your birthday suck.”

Not so accustom to the fact that ‘birthdays’ were special days Grimmjow didn’t seem very phased by that sentiment. Sure he liked his ring and beating this shinigami to a bloody mess but… He reflected on the fact that Kurosaki had said before ‘I’m glad you exist’. He’d never heard anything like that from anyone before and he was inclined to believe it. “It didn’t.” It didn’t suck.

Ichigo looked over, watching Grimmjow stare at the empty street ahead of them. The air in Karakura was fresher and the buildings and paths for humans and vehicles were less worn. It was because Ichigo knew of life in this wonderful place that he was averse to the city – it was unfavorable. Here in Karakura the night was quieter and clearer. He took a deep breath and smiled a little – glad.

Unless someone had told him or shown him greener grass Grimmjow would have never thought anything of the difference. He wasn’t going to go back to that stale apartment though. There was a corpse in the shower that had its head blown off. He’d heard it happen. That’s why he was there. Grimmjow could understand that concept, just getting so unsettled until the point of blowing… That could have been him. Some days it could have been…but today made thoughts like that run for cover.

“This feels like I’m dreaming.”

About to tell Kurosaki to stick those feelings up places Grimmjow realized something else he wanted to say, “Then fuck consequence and your conscience.” The disagreeable opinion of the arrancar came to light. He knew he was suggesting Kurosaki to betray his life now, and Grimmjow didn’t care. It was selfish…he just didn’t care.

Allowing his smile to fade slowly Ichigo sighed and started to walk away then, feet tapping the cement. He didn’t think he could or should forsake those.

Grimmjow turned and started to yell, “What the fuck are you running from?!”

“Everything! Stop it!” Ichigo growled. It wasn’t true but he was frustrated. In a second he had to halt walking quickly as Grimmjow bounded up in front of him and as the shinigami tried to sidestep the arrancar blocked him. Two hybrid races at peculiar odds.

“Not so fucking fun is it?” To get boxed in. “ _You_ started this…” the arrancar snarled. He was angry and for once Grimmjow had absolutely every right to be. Kurosaki had opened this door and Grimmjow was holding it open for the both of them.

“I didn’t know what it would turn into!” Ichigo started to feel guilty that he hadn’t considered more carefully. All he’d thought about was giving Grimmjow a birthday gift. He didn’t know how much it would mean… He didn’t think about those kinds of things… He just did them.

Both men of action stalled their words and felt like holding their breath, frustrated, watching each other.

Grimmjow grabbed Kurosaki’s shoulders and stared straight into the face of his ire and shook the shinigami once. “Kurosaki, I can’t fucking- … Without you I can’t…I don’t have _anything_ to do!” Nothing he wanted to do at least.

Ichigo already figured this. Shaking his head he fought against the jostling shake, “I can fight you but I can’t help you more than that.”

Grimmjow gritted his teeth and squeezed the shinigami’s shoulders looking over the battered face refusing to look at him. He was ready to tear Kurosaki in half. This bastard couldn’t do this to him! Make him feel something then put a cap on it!

Then came the rain, a few drops turned into a sudden cold downpour and as Ichigo tried to get away from Grimmjow, the arrancar held on. Ichigo jerked his body but Grimmjow’s grip wouldn’t quit.

Grimmjow stared through the rain soaking his angular face and plastering down his hair. This weather felt terribly appropriate. He looked fairly stressed out.

Soaked too, with clothes clinging to him and dripping rainwater off of his flattened hair in the relative dark Ichigo took his hands and turned them into fists and hit Grimmjow in the face.

It hurt but all he did was take it and held on, even if just by the wet fabric of Kurosaki’s shirt; the shinigami would have to tear off the sleeves to get away from him. Kurosaki hit him two more times, hard punches to the face. Grimmjow’s head snapped one way and wobbled; his lip drooled with blood from a reopened cut. The world slowed down. He was in pain, _doubly_. His neck ached from holding his head up and where the blows had hit him were sore. His head felt heavy… Then Grimmjow felt Kurosaki lift his face and push lips coarsely up to his. An immediate warmth surged from that contact point into his chest. Dazed but coming around the arrancar’s hands moved around the shinigami’s soaked and fabric covered back, tipped his head, shut his eyes and enjoyed this like it was the last he would get of it. For all he knew that was so. He enjoyed this shinigami so much he could devour him…and loathed Ichigo at the same time. He could only taste of him though, because if he ate him Kurosaki would be gone. When the heat of Ichigo’s mouth came back and breath broke between them again Grimmjow finally let go with a shaky breath that left him feeling vulnerable.

The men’s limbs dripped as the sky still poured down rain.

Ichigo stepped back, wiping some of the water off of his face and shaking his head. He looked confused and searching for some answer in the rain and Grimmjow’s face. Hazel eyes trembled. Why did he encourage this?

Grimmjow’s blue eyes looked no more enlightened but settled among the streaks of rain. The drenched arrancar licked the blood off his lip and took his heavy jacket, that couldn’t absorb water, off and even though he bared himself by the chest he put the jacket on the shinigami and stepped back. “I’d do a hell of a lot more for you if you’d let me.”

The warmth of another body had stolen away but the jacket helped; he was getting cold. Ichigo held onto the leather of the zipper’s parting in the front and stared at Grimmjow standing back from him, noticing the rain washing over the large scar he’d given him a long time ago and strangely he started to smile again, “You need a cold shower…”

Grimmjow lifted his arms and shoulders in a broad shrug in the rain. This was certainly it. He licked the blood on his lip again. “What I need is _you_.” He pointed sternly forward, his right hand displaying the thick pointy ring he’d been given today. He didn’t want anyone else. If he was cold he didn’t show it…because something in his chest was warm. Grimmjow lowered his dripping arm.

Unable to fend it off Ichigo felt his chest tighten but he shook his head again.

“I won’t ask you for fuckin’ anything else.”

“Yeah right…” Ichigo scoffed but he cracked a smile and swallowed, water dripping off his face as much as the town’s fixtures and buildings around them. Endless was the dark of night but they lit up this space.

Blinking away the rain that pelted him Grimmjow rolled his eyes and shifted his feet in soggy dark shoes. “Fighting seemed like a given…”

Ichigo paused for a moment of careful thought. “You’ll have to wait for me to figure this out…” he explained, looking more serious as water ran over his cheeks and jaw. “I can’t just…disappear with you.”

“Even though you want to.” Enduring the burn of feeling vulnerable Grimmjow didn’t care if it was putting words in Kurosaki’s mouth, he wanted to know.

Ichigo sighed and nodded. He…did.

“And you’ll fight me just like always?”

“I can do that.” Ichigo’s expression warmed.

“Then I can wait.” Even if it meant standing in the rain.

Read ALL my fanfictions on ArchiveofOurOwn.org. Art via: DeviantArt.com/FicticiousDelicious or FicticiousDelicious.Tumblr.com

**Author's Note:**

> Normally I tag for 'no sex' but I wanted people to walk into this one wondering (because it's a short story, not an investment).
> 
> If you like the gay sex scenes I write you'll be happy to know that there is an explicit deleted scene for this fanfiction that I cut which I will be adding to my collection of random 'standalone' GrimmIchi writings: For the Sake of Fucking. It is the fifth section in that collection, 'Showering in Pain'. Mind the tags on it. I will talk a bit more about this scene over there.


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